OU professor loves company of felines

by Gail Cetnar
THE POST

Heather S. Hughes/ THE POST Twelve of Susan Tice-Alike's 17 cats eat dinner together on the back porch of her home. Only four of the cats are given the privilege to live inside but all 17 have access to the sunroom equipped as cat living quarters.

Every morning, Ohio University psychology professor Susan Tice-Alicke is greeted by the pitter-patter of little feet - 17 sets of them.

Tice-Alicke starts each day by feeding Iams dry food to her 17 cats. A 20-pound bag of food lasts from 10 days to two weeks, she said. She spends less than $100 a month for the food.

Some students in her elementary statistical reasoning class scoffed when they heard that their probability problems about her cats were based on reality.

Sophomore journalism student Breann Boggs said while some students thought it was strange, she thought Tice-Alicke's cat ownership was admirable. Boggs was in her class Winter Quarter.

"You have to be a special person to own one cat, let alone 17. And she knew all their names," Boggs said. "I was amazed. I did not ever see a cat hair on her."

Indeed, Tice-Alicke's cats are well cared for and her two-story house, in Vinton County, is immaculate. The yellow walls, hardwood floors and floral print furniture give the house a light, airy feel. Everything is tidy and in place.

Four cats stay indoors. The rest roam outdoors during the day and sleep in an enclosed porch, complete with eight cat beds, at night.

" When I leave for work or when I come home, the first thing that comes out is the vacuum," she said. "I want things to be very clean."

Tice-Alicke, a petite young woman who earned her experimental psychology doctorate from OU in 1995, started to adopt the cats when she began graduate school.

"There was a neighbor who had a lot of cats that she didn't spay or neuter, and (the cats) would leave for weeks at a time," she said. "In the fall of 1989 I started trying to tame them. From January to May in 1990 a litter was born every month."

Tice-Alicke said she tried to find homes for the kittens but ended up keeping many of them. All of them are spayed or neutered, but most are not declawed.

When she met her husband, OU psychology professor Mark Alicke, she was wary about letting him visit because she was worried about what he would think.

"She was already famous as the cat lady before I met her," her husband said.

Mark owned two cats before they married in 1997. Before then, Tice-Alicke taught in Kentucky where she and her cats lived in a manufactured home.

He said that although the number of her cats was unusual, he accepted them. But he made rules about the number allowed in the house. The cats enjoy the outdoors, though, and go for walks.

Every evening Tice-Alicke said she calls in a merry voice, "Here kitty, kitty, kitty! Come on guys, you wanna go walk?"

The cats slowly emerge from their cozy spots on the deck or in the yard, and follow her and her husband into the forest. They do not wear leashes and about 10 usually go each evening, she said.

There are two different paths where they hike. The cats spread out and investigate plants and bugs and other things along the way, but they follow the couple as they walk.

"There's a stereotype that cats stay very much to themselves and I feel they break that," Tice-Alicke said. "We're always joking around about psychological principles and how they apply to the cats."

Despite her love for animals, she does support some animal testing, she said.

"Being an experimental psychologist, I understand the importance of research to find cures to diseases," she said. In one of her classes, she must teach students that cats' eyes are sewn shut during various experiments.

"It tugs on the heart," she said.

It is especially difficult when one of the cats dies, she said. Two are buried on one side of her front yard. Four cats are 11 years old and six are 10 years old, so she knows she will have to deal with death in the coming years, she said.

"I try to focus on how I'm a better person because of them," she said sadly.

Tice-Alicke said she considers the cats part of the family. They know their names and do not fight often.

"My mom and dad call themselves Grammy and Grampy to the cats," she said. "I feel they give back to me. They're affectionate and allow me to fuss and be mother-like. Cephus likes to be sung to and rocked."